Saying Goodbye?
by ChandaK562
Summary: In the aftermath of their return from the alien planet, Coulson asks Daisy to find out what arrangements have been made for Rosalind Price's funeral.
1. Chapter 1

"Coulson?" Daisy knocked on the door of Coulson's office, still struggling with what she had to tell him. Should she tell him? Would it make things better or worse? As messed up as Coulson had been since getting back from the alien planet two weeks before, she was really afraid that it might make things worse, but at the same time keeping the information from him would be beyond cruel.

Before she had time to debate it more, he called out to her. "Daisy? what do you need?"

"Hey." Daisy pushed the door open and stepped into the office, still struggling to decide what to do. Whatever she did, Coulson was going to be hurt, and seeing him sitting at his desk, the misery apparent on his face, hurting him was the last thing she wanted to do. She silently cursed Ward for putting them in this position and cursed herself for not letting Ward die two years before when she had had the opportunity to let Mike Peterson kill him. Why hadn't she let him die then? Or why hadn't she put those bullets in his fat head when she shot him? If she had taken either of those opportunities, this entire situation wouldn't happen, and even if no one else blamed her, she sure blamed herself.

"Daisy?" Coulson called her name again. "If you don't need something…."

"Need something. Right. I need to tell you something." She had to tell him. Not telling him would just be way too cruel. "You know how you asked me to find out when Rosalind's funeral was, once everything had calmed down, or where she was going to be buried or what the arrangements were going to be?"

Coulson nodded, a wave of pain washing over him at the mention of Rosalind's name, and he was back there again, one minute happy and then seeing her bleeding out of the floor, begging her to stay with him and then being forced to leave her there as Hydra came after him. "Did you find out what the arrangements are? Or were?" Two weeks, he was sure the funeral was long over, but at least he wanted the chance to visit her grave and say goodbye, to tell her how sorry he was for what had happened to her, how she didn't deserve it and….

"The arrangements." Daisy bit her lip, still struggling over what to do, but the expectant look on Coulson's face, she had to do something. "Apparently someone called the police because a gun battle and explosions and stuff aren't exactly quiet. And I guess there was some confusion about what happened, and then when they realized Hydra was involved, they tried to keep things quiet and…."

"No public funeral then?" Coulson said. He wasn't sure how Rosalind would have felt about that. He didn't think that she would have wanted some sort of big show, but still, she had tried so hard to do something good, and that should have been acknowledged.

The funeral. About that. Like I said, he police were called, and there was apparently some sort of confusion about who was supposed to have responsibility for the crime scene with the whole ATCU situation, and the Secret Service got called in and the FBI, and then the military for some reason." Daisy told him. "And while everyone was arguing about who was supposed to be in charge of things, the coroner from NCIS, who I have no idea why those people were there because we're the ones with the helicarrier, not the ATCU. But anyway, somehow they were tossed into the mix too, and their coroner thought it would be a good idea to do something about checking the body on the floor and doing whatever coroners are supposed to do with bodies. Only when he checked, he found a really, really weak pulse."

"A…." Coulson's jaw dropped. A pulse? He had missed a…. But the blood and the way Rosalind had been shot, it would have been easy to miss a pulse, especially as her heartbeat slowed in response to the massive blood loss, and then with Hydra coming after him, it wasn't like he had had a lot of time to focus on assessing her condition after that first panic-filled minute when he had begged her to stay awake, to stay with him. It didn't make him feel better, of course, to realize that missing a weak pulse would have been an easy mistake, and he cursed himself for it, for the fact that he had missed that Rosalind was still alive and that he had left her alone on that floor fighting for her life. He had left her alone and what if Hydra had realized she was still alive and captured her? No, don't think about the what ifs. Just focus on…. "Hospital." He dug in his desk drawer with his remaining hand and tossed the keys to Lola to Daisy. He hadn't been able to face getting his hand replaced yet, and there was no way he trusted himself to drive. Get to the hospital, get to Rosalind, make sure she was safe with Malick still on the loose and then worry about his guilt over leaving her and trying to figure out some way to make the fact he had abandoned her at the worst possible time up to her. Did they make enough flowers to even touch on making up for something like that? Flowers. He should get flowers, shouldn't he? What sort of flowers, though? He had left the poor woman to nearly bleed to death on her own floor. He didn't have a whole lot of experience, but he was pretty sure the answer to that was all of the flowers he could find, and keep them coming. Hospitals had flowers, right? First make sure that Rosalind was safe and then he could go and get all of the flowers he could carry for her. That would work. And maybe something else, or a lot of something elses? Who did he know who screwed up relationships a lot who could offer advice? There was Hunter, but as much as he goofed stuff up with Bobbi, he didn't think he had approached this level of screwing up.

No. He shook his head. Worry about all of that later. Get to the hospital and make sure Rosalind was safe, first of all, and make sure that she stayed safe. Malick was still out there even if Ward was dead, and she could still be in danger. Two weeks. Two weeks since she was injured. She ought to be okay enough after two weeks to be moved. She would be safe at the Playground until she recovered fully. Plan, he had a plan. Now to…. "Daisy?" He said when he suddenly realized that she wasn't following him towards the door.

How could she tell him? The look on his face, like he had just been given a miracle, how could she tell him? "AC, there's something you need to know." Daisy said, using the nickname she had given Coulson when she first met him. "Rosalind, you know she lost a lot of blood and the way Ward shot her was pretty bad. They said it was a miracle she made it to the hospital to begin with." She didn't want to do this. She didn't want to do this and break his heart. "They were able to repair the damage but she's been in a coma ever since that night and her doctors say there isn't anything else they can do for her. Her family's made arrangements to take her off of life support. I'm so sorry, AC."

"They…. She's dying?" Coulson's voice was a soft whisper that she could barely hear.

"They're taking her off the machines tonight." Daisy told him, tears welling in her eyes at the expression on his face, like he had been kicked in the stomach. "AC, I'm so sorry. I wasn't sure if I should tell you, but I thought you deserved to know." She wanted to go to him, to hug him and offer some sort of comfort, but the expression on his face, she was half afraid that if she touched him he would shatter.

"Thank you." Dying, Rosalind was dying. He had spent the last two weeks thinking she was dead. He had struggled to try to find some acceptance of that awful fact, had tried to find a way to live with the memories of seeing her bleeding out in front of him, but finding out that she wasn't dead, finding out that he had gotten a miracle and she had survived, only to learn he was going to lose her anyway…. He fought back the urge to throw up. "The hospital, please?" He asked Daisy.

"Okay." Daisy told him. "Do you want me to get May to come with us? We'll need something besides Lola."

"No, she doesn't need to deal with this." And maybe it wasn't fair to ask Daisy to deal with it, but…. "The hospital, please?" Rosalind was dying, and it might be totally inadequate but he was going to be there to tell her goodbye. "And…. Maybe a flowershop on the way if you think we would have time?"


	2. Chapter 2

"Wait for me here." Coulson told Daisy as the pair of them walked down the hallway of the hospital and he spotted the visitors' lounge.

"Coulson, I don't think that's a good idea." Daisy told him. Letting him go to see his…. Was girlfriend the right word for what Coulson had with Rosalind anyway? Whatever it was, letting him go to see her on her deathbed alone seemed like the worst idea in the world.

"No, just wait for me. It probably won't be long. Daisy, I'll be alright. I promise. Just wait."

Daisy stood in the doorway, reluctant to go in and sit down, watching as Coulson walked down the hallway in search of Rosalind's room, the colorful arrangement of roses he had paid an astronomical price for cradled in his remaining hand. This wasn't going to be good. She had a terrible feeling about how bad this was going to be, and it was all she could do to keep herself from running after him. But saying goodbye to Rosalind, would he be able to do that properly, with her hovering and trying to comfort him? And Coulson deserved so much to have a chance to say a proper goodbye. Daisy closed her eyes for a moment, debating, before opening them and reluctantly going into the lounge, finding a seat near the television a group of children who had a look in their eyes she didn't think kids should have were clustered around. She would give Coulson a little while to have his privacy and then she would go check on him. And maybe she ought to think about calling Agent May, too, to let her know what was going on. She really needed to know what had happened.

There wasn't security. That was the first thing that Coulson noticed as he approached Rosalind's door, the fact that there wasn't anyone there to provide protection to her. And the area she was in wasn't a closed off section like ICU, but was a floor devoted to caring for the terminally ill, so there wasn't even a door or a desk to get past to reach her room. If someone came after her, she was totally undefended. How could they leave her unprotected? But then he shook his head as he recalled her condition. Dying. She was dying. Why would they have security there for a woman who was on her deathbed? Who would care enough to try to speed up a death that was going to happen in maybe an hour or so anyway?

The door of the room was closed, and Phil had to shuffle the flowers to manage to open it enough to slip in. Rosalind was there, tucked into the hospital bed, eyes closed, bandages and a brace around her neck, the ventilator tubing in her throat connecting her to the machine at her bedside, IV lines dripping fluid into both arms and wires for monitors everywhere. But despite all of that, Phil's first thought was that she was beautiful, with dark hair that looked freshly washed curling around her face and dressed in soft blue pajamas instead of the traditional hospital gown. She looked beautiful and it was all he could do not to break down. How could this be happening, how could have have gotten the miracle of getting Rosalind back only to be losing her again?

"Hello?" A voice made him jump and if he hadn't been holding the flowers and missing a hand he would have smacked himself in the head for his lack of observation. He had completely missed the woman who was setting in a chair by Rosalind's side, holding her hand. Dark hair pulled into a ponytail, pale skin with dark circles under painfully familiar eyes that were filled with heartbreak. Obviously someone from Rosalind's family, and he suddenly didn't know what to say. He hadn't let himself think beyond getting to her bedside. What in the world could he possibly say to her family?

"Hello?" Rosalind's sister, Celia, said as she got to her feet, wondering if she ought to hit the call button to get someone in there. Her sister had been shot under circumstances that she still wasn't entirely sure she understood, and she had been jumpy ever since she got here, especially with the lack of security once they moved her sister out of ICU in preparation for withdrawing life support. But then she got a closer look at the man and saw that he was balancing the arrangement of colorful roses while missing a hand. "Phil?"

"Phil Coulson." She knew his name?

"I'm Rosalind's sister, Celia." she said as she hurried over, offering him a hesitant smile as she took the flowers to be placed on a shelf. "I'm so sorry. Rosalind told me about you but she didn't tell me about how I could reach you. And I'm afraid that the government hasn't been the most helpful. I think they would have preferred it if Rosalind would have died two weeks ago so they could try to pretend the entire ATCU situation never happened. I'm really glad you're here. I wanted to contact you. I know that Rosalind would want you here, but I didn't have the vaguest idea of how to start looking." Was she babbling a bit? Probably, but she couldn't help it. What must this man think of her, not contacting him to let him know Rosalind was still alive, and now what was about to happen, taking Rosalind off of the machines keeping her alive. Surely he had to hate her for that if he knew. "Please, sit down. Roz?" She called to her sister even though she knew she couldn't hear her. "Phil's here to see you, sweetie. I know you wanted him here. Please, sit down." She said again as she motioned Phil towards the chair opposite where she had been sitting. Both of them sitting, maybe if he was angry with her over her decision, it would somehow make it not as bad if they were off their feet?

"Roz?" Phil reached out and took her hand without thinking. Warm, her hand felt warm and soft in his grip. How could she feel so warm and alive and be dying? Wasn't someone who was dying supposed to feel cold? "I'm here. I'm so sorry. I am so, so sorry." And despite his not wanting to, he felt a tear slipping down his cheek. She was alive by some miracle. How could he have gotten a miracle and got her back only to have to tell her goodbye? How could he tell her goodbye? They had just found each other. How could it be over so soon?

"I'm so sorry." Celia whispered, a tear slipping down her own cheek as she saw the expression on Phil's face. "If there was anything else that could be done, or any other option…. I'm so sorry."

"It isn't your fault." If it was anyone's fault, the fault was his. He should have known that Rosalind would have been a target, both for her position with the ATCU and because of his feelings for her. Why hadn't he protected her? Stupid, he had been so stupid, caught up in the first flush of love like a teenager, that he had failed to take even the most basic of precautions, and now Rosalind was suffering the consequences for it. "I am so sorry." He whispered an apology to her once again.

"She talked about you a lot." Celia settled into her chair once again, picked up the bottle of bubblegum pink nail polish she had been about to open when Phil had came in, and started to carefully apply it to her sister's nails. "I know that the two of you hadn't known each other long, but you made Rosalind really happy. I hadn't heard her talk like that in years, since she lost her husband. I was hoping to find a way to contact you, to thank you for that, for making my sister happy. If I have to lose her, that's one thing that I'm glad of, that she got to be happy again before she died."

Phil closed his eyes, Celia's words cutting through him like the bullet that had cut through Rosalind's throat. If she knew the truth, that this was all his fault, that her sister was dying because he had been an idiot, if she knew how he had abandoned her…. He felt sick, and a sudden urge to throw up hit him. After what he had done, to have Rosalind's sister trying to comfort him and sympathize with him, knowing he didn't deserve it…. "There's something that you need to know." He said. She would probably throw him out if she didn't call security, but how could he stay here with her not knowing the truth?

"That you were there when it happened? I know." Celia told him, looking over at him and giving him a sad smile.

"You…." That wasn't what he expected to hear at all. "How?"

"I had to go to Roz's to get some paperwork together a few days ago. She had documents drawn up for what she wanted done if she was ever in a condition like this, and I needed to look over them. I saw the dining room and the dinner, so it was pretty obvious someone else was there, and like I said, Rosalind had talked to me about you so it wasn't hard to guess who that was." She hesitated, not sure if she should ask anything else or not, not wanting to cause more pain, even though there were things she so badly needed to know.

"You saw…." If he hadn't wanted to throw up before, he definitely did now, imagining Rosalind's sister walking into the situation he had left behind, with the blood and the improvised explosive he had made out of candles and aerosols. "I am so sorry." He got to his feet, intending to leave, even though the thought of not being there for Rosalind for the little time she had left killed him. But her sister knew, and why wasn't she calling security to have him thrown out? Why hadn't she called security the instant that she realized who he was? "I'm so sorry. I'll go. I know that you couldn't want…."

"Please don't go!" Celia jumped to her feet and reached out to catch him before he could move away from the bed. "It's alright, really. Rosalind loved you. She would want you to be here. Please, don't go. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that I knew. I just didn't want you to feel bad thinking I didn't and…. Please, don't go. Please?"

Coulson wasn't sure what to do. She didn't want him to leave? But how could he stay, knowing that she knew he had been there, knew he had abandoned her sister, that…. "I should go. If you know that I was there, that I left Rosalind there…." His fault, all his fault, and now he was hurting her sister too. He definitely needed to get out of there.

"It's okay, I promise. Please stay." Celia got up and moved around to the other side of the bed to keep him from leaving, even though she guessed in a contest between a spy and a kindergarten teacher she was probably going to lose if he really wanted to go. "Please? I want you to stay. Please?"

"I left her there." Coulson whispered. "I didn't protect her and then I left her there." He had left her. Had Rosalind realized that? He had thought she was dead, but she had obviously only been unconscious. Had some part of her realized what he had done, leaving her there, bleeding out on the floor to save himself? If she had…. He stumbled, thinking about that, about how Rosalind must have felt in those last few minutes if she had been aware at all, abandoned and alone, and then he was in the bathroom and actually throwing up. "I left her." He whispered when he finally finished gagging up what little he had managed to eat that day. "I'm so sorry."

"It wasn't your fault." Celia was in the door, and the look of compassion in her eyes and the hand she was holding out to him tore him to shreds. "Please, come back and sit down."

"I left her there." He should leave, he knew, but somehow Celia had hold of him and was tugging him back to Rosalind's bedside, and pushing up into the chair at her side once more. "I'm so sorry." He reached out and touched her cheek, careful not to disturb the device holding the ventilator tubing in place. Her skin was so soft and so warm, and he once again wondered how could she feel like that and be about to die. "Rosalind, I'm so sorry. I am so, so sorry."

"This isn't your fault." Celia tried to tell him once again. "There were thirty or forty people there after it happened, and none of them realized that she was alive. According to what her doctors have told me, she shouldn't have survived that gunshot to begin with. How could you have known?"

"I should have. Or I shouldn't have left her there, no matter what." Why had he left her there? Fury had moved heaven and earth to bring him back. He had been willing to do anything to save Daisy. Why hadn't he tried to do that for Rosalind? Or at least not have left her there for Hydra to possibly take her and do who knows what will her.

"I don't think you could have moved her, at least not without her actually ending up bleeding to death." Celia told him. She looked down gently at her sister as tears stung her eyes. "And as terrifying and awful as the last two weeks have been, I got two more weeks with my sister that I wouldn't trade for anything, so if you leaving her there gave me that time, then thank you."

Was she serious? But looking over at her, Coulson could tell that she was somehow. "I just wish…. This shouldn't have happened. I should have known that Malick would have sent someone after her and with Ward working for him…. This shouldn't have happened."

"Gideon Malick? Roz warned me about him, not that she thought he knew anything about me, but she warned me to keep my eyes open." Celia said as she finished applying the nail polish, and started to work with another bottle, painting cheery looking daisies onto her sister's nails. "What did he do?" And had he said the name Ward? "And Ward, you're not talking about the guy that caused that plane crash a few weeks ago, are you?"

"That's him, unfortunately." The people on that plane, Ward's latest victims before Rosalind. "He was the one who…."

"Who shot my sister?"

"Partially on Malick's orders, partially because he hates me, partially because he's crazy." Coulson stroked Rosalind's cheek again as he spoke. Why hadn't he made sure that Ward had been taken out sooner? So many people would still be alive if he had just used the same weapon he had used on Garrett on him.

"Is he still out there?" Celia asked, a bit of fear in her voice. Someone who caused a plane crash and killed over three hundred people, who was currently being listed as a terrorist and a suspect in what had been mistakenly called the murder-suicide of his parents and brother, had shot her sister. Why in the world hadn't someone arranged some sort of protection for Rosalind? She knew that the higher-ups would have preferred for her to have died two weeks ago, and they were certainly hoping for a quiet death for her now, but how could they just leave her unguarded when all she ever did was try to do something good?

"He's dead. She's safe here, I promise." Coulson reassured her.

"Good. I hope it was painful." Celia murmured. With how that thing had hurt her sister, she felt perfectly justified in wishing the most painful death possible on him.

What could he say to that? Ward's death certainly had been painful but he really didn't want to discuss it. Instead his eyes drifted down to Rosalind's fingers as Celia motioned for him to move her other hand a bit so she could apply the painted daisies to them as well. "Is there some reason you're doing daisies?"

"My kids gave the nail polish to me as an early Christmas present. Pink and white nail polish, it was either daisies or trying my hands at a french manicure, which I'm terrible at, and I want her to look nice. I know it doesn't really matter, but I just want her to look nice when she goes."

"You have kids?" Rosalind had never mentioned nieces or nephews, but when he looked up he noticed more about the room that he had missed at first viewing, cards drawn by an obviously childish hand or hands were taped to the wall across from the bed, and there was a small Christmas tree there as well, with a selection of small packages tucked underneath.

"I teach kindergarten. I was actually in class when someone finally got around to calling me and telling me what happened to Roz. I was really messed up, and of course the kids got to see it all. The teacher across the hall helped them make get well cards while I was trying to get a flight to get here. I put them up where she could see them when she woke up, and I guess I ought to take them down and the tree too. I'm not sure why I put them back up when they moved her down here, but…." Tears started to slowly roll down her cheeks as she looked at the pictures, and the cheerful little tree she had found at the airport, bought with the thought of comforting an injured and grumpy sister who was probably going to have to spend Christmas stuck in the hospital. "I just don't think I can, not yet. That's probably okay, right? They won't need the room cleared out right away, so I can probably wait to take everything down and pack it up until it's over, don't you think?"

"I'm sure they'll give you as much time as you need." And if they didn't, Coulson was honestly prepared to fight them to get that for Rosalind's obviously heartbroken sister. "Is there any other family who'll be here?" Family, that was one of the many topics he had never had a chance to talk to Rosalind about. So many things that he had wanted to say to her, things he wanted to find out and now it was too late. He could ask her sister some of the questions, he knew, but it wouldn't be the same.

"There are cousins that will probably be at the funeral, but other than that, it was really just the two of us. The doctor said that they could have someone from pastoral care or a social worker here when they did it, but I didn't think Roz would want that, a stranger being there just to watch her go. I'm really glad you're here. I know that the two of you hadn't known each other long but you made her so happy. She actually mentioned the love word once, and the only time I've ever heard her say that was when she was with her husband. Thank you for that, for making her happy that way again."

"I…. It wasn't long, but it was good. I wasn't sure what might have happened with it, but it was really good. Relationships in certain lines of work, they can be really hard to make work but this…." He gently stroked Rosalind's cheek again and then gathered her hand into his once more. "I wanted to see where it would go. We were happy, and maybe it wasn't the best time or circumstances, but I wanted to see where it would go. You said I made your sister happy, well she made me happy too. I just wish that we had had a little longer."

A little longer. He didn't know how long they sat there silently after he said that, it felt like it was just a few minutes but he knew it had been longer, when the door came open and a doctor came in.

"Is it time already?" Celia asked, a frightened look on her face at the sight of the man in the white lab coat.

"If you want, we can wait a bit longer." the doctor said in what would probably be a reassuring tone if her heart wasn't in her throat at it hit her that these were her last moments with her big sister.

"No." Waiting wouldn't help, Celia knew. She would never be ready to say goodbye and Rosalind wouldn't want to be left like this. "We can do it now." Tears were pouring down her cheeks as she leaned over and pressed a kiss to her sister's cheek. She felt so warm still, like she was still there and just sleeping. "Roz, the doctor's here, okay? We're going to do what you wanted. I love you, sweetie. I'm going to hold your hand, okay, and I'm not going to let go. I love you."

"Roz?" Coulson whispered softly in her ear at even trying to hold back his own tears. She deserved them, to be properly mourned and grieved for. "I'm here. I'm so sorry. I love you. I wish I had told you that before." Could some part of her hear him now? He sent up a silent prayer that she could. "I love you. I'm going to stay right here and hold your other hand, I promise, and I'll make sure your sister's taken care of like you would have wanted. I love you and you made me so happy. I love you, sweetheart. It's going to be okay."

"Like we talked about earlier, it should happen fairly quickly." the doctor turned off the screens on the monitors before turning to the ventilator, turning the machine off and removing the breathing tube from Rosalind's throat. "I'm very sorry for your loss." he said, as he stepped back to give them a chance to say anything they had left to say as Rosalind's body went still.


	3. Chapter 3

She couldn't bring herself to actually say the word goodbye. Celia just gently stroked her sister's hair as tears steamed down her cheeks. "I love you." She whispered. "I love you so much, sweetie." She still felt so warm but her body was so still. The doctor had explained what would happen when the machines were turned off, but still, nothing had prepared her for this, her sister still feeling like she was there when she was gone.

"I love you." Phil whispered into Rosalind's ear. If some part of her was somehow able to hear, he wanted that to be the last thing that she heard, how much she was loved. "I love you." he whispered again as he leaned over and pressed a kiss to her forehead. If he kissed her lips, if he remembered the last time they had kissed, he didn't think he could handle it, so he settled for that forehead kiss instead.

"You can stay with her as long as you like." The doctor told them. "I can make arrangements for you not to be disturbed until you're ready."

"Thank you." Celia said. "Do you think…. Roz?" Her eyes flew away from the doctor and back to her sister as she heard a noise.

"Roz?" Coulson's eyes went wide as he took in what was happening. After being so frighteningly still, Rosalind was suddenly gasping for breath.

"Roz, sweetie?" Breathing. Her sister was breathing, and somehow seeing her like that, gasping for air, was more frightening than seeing her so still. "Sweetie, I'm right here. We're both right here. It's okay. It's okay, I promise. I love you, sweetie. I'm right here." She frantically stroked her sister's cheek with the hand that wasn't clutching her fingers, looking from her sister's face to the doctor, wanting him to do something, but not knowing what could be done or what should be done. "Roz?" Was some part of her sister in there, maybe terrified, not knowing what was happening to her? "Sweetie?"

"Roz?" Why wasn't the doctor doing something, although Coulson wasn't sure either what he expected him to do in a situation like this. She was breathing, though. Did that mean that maybe there was some hope? Or that there was something? "Roz?" There was something that he should be doing, hadn't Shield's field medical training covered something like this? He was sure there was something he should be doing to help her, but honestly in that moment any training he had had flown right out of his head and why wasn't the doctor helping her?

"I'm so sorry." the doctor said. He hated it when this happened, the agonal breathing that terrified families so much, and he hadn't warned Ms. Price's sister about it because he had been sure in this case it wouldn't happen. "Agonal breathing happens sometimes in cases like this, although with your sister's total dependance on the ventilator, I hadn't expected it. I'll get something to make her a bit more comfortable. She doesn't need to suffer like that."

"She's breathing on her own. She couldn't breathe on her own before." Celia stammered. "Does that mean she's getting better?" Had she agreed to turning off the machines too soon? It had been what Rosalind had wanted, she had been very specific about her wishes and the criteria to be used to determine if those wishes should be put into effect, but what if she had been wrong? What if she had given up too soon? She would never forgive herself if she had given up on her sister too soon, but she prayed desperately that that would be the case now because it would mean that Rosalind would live.

"I'm so sorry." He should have talked to her more about this and he wasn't sure how to break this to her now, seeing the sudden hope in both of these people's eyes. Before he could thank of what to say, or try to come up with a way to break it to these people that this was simply part of the dying process, the gasping stopped as quickly as it started. "I'm so sorry. I…."

"Roz?" Coulson whispered her name, afraid for a moment what the end of those gasps might mean, before her chest rose again, as she took a slower, easier breath, followed by another and another. He suddenly cursed himself for not getting that hand replaced. He wanted to touch her face, to reassure himself that what he was seeing was real, that she was there, warm and breathing when he had been trying seconds before to tell her goodbye, but he didn't dare release his grip on her hand, not wanting her to think for a second that he had left her again.

"She's breathing." Celia whispered. "Roz? Sweetie?" She reached out and gently stoked her sister's forehead, pressing another kiss to her cheek. "Did you just need a little more time to get some strength back, Sweetie? What do we do for her now?" She asked the doctor.

"I'm afraid that the fact she's breathing on her own at the moment is likely a temporary thing." the doctor said in his kindest tone. "It sometimes happens that a patient does start breathing on their own after the ventilator's removed, but likely your sister's prognosis hasn't changed long term." He moved to Rosalind's bedside as he spoke and pressed his stethoscope to her chest. Heartbeat sounded strong, and her lungs seemed clear, her breathing easy, but still he couldn't see this as anything but temporary.

"So she's still going to…." Celia whispered. Her sister was breathing on her own. How could she still be dying?

"I'm very sorry. Based on the amount of blood she lost and the decreased brain activity her scans showed, I really don't see this changing her prognosis. If you want, we can run more tests, or we can look at putting her back on the machines again but…."

"She didn't want that." But Rosalind had just said that she didn't want the machines if she couldn't breathe on her own. What if she could, but maybe just needed a little help? How could she decide something like that? "How long? I mean, how long will I have to decide?"

"Her heartbeat's strong for the moment, and her lungs seem clear. It could be hours or it could be days. There's no real way to say for sure. We can focus on making her comfortable for the moment and give you time to decide if you want. You only agreed to removing the ventilator. We can still continue with the TPN, fluids, antibiotics and pain medications unless you decide that they need to be discontinued as well."

"No. I don't want anything else discontinued." She wasn't sure if she had made the right decision at all to have the ventilator discontinued, so she certainly wasn't turning anything else off. "We have time to decide what to do?"

"Given her injuries, I would say a few hours, but it could be longer. There's really no way to tell. I could have someone from social services or pastoral care come and talk to you about your decisions if that might help you to feel more secure with your decision."

"No." She hadn't wanted a stranger there to see her sister die, had known that Rosalind would have hated that, and she definitely didn't want a stranger there now, trying to tell her that turning things off was okay. "Just give us some time, please?"

"I'll tell the nurse to page me as soon as there's a change." the doctor told her before turning and starting for the door. "I'm so sorry for this."

"What do I do?" Celia asked as soon as the door was closed and they were alone once more. She looked down at the sister. Rosalind was breathing easily, her eyes closed like she was sleeping. How could she possibly still be dying? "I only agreed to taking her off the ventilator because her brain activity was so low, and they tried four times to wean her off of the vent and she never was able to breathe on her own." But suddenly, miraculously, her sister was breathing. "What do I do? You can stay, can't you?" She looked at Phil with sudden worry.

"I'm not leaving, I promise." Phil said. He had left Rosalind once before, and he wasn't going to make that mistake again. He was staying at her side no matter what, no matter how little time she might have left. But he found himself praying as he watched her breathing, his fingers holding her hand, gently stroking her skin. He had thought he had lost Rosalind, he had struggled to find some acceptance of that nightmarish fact. Then he had believed for a few moments he had got a miracle and had gotten her back before Daisy had given him the news she was dying. He had seen her go still after the machines were turned off and he had tried to tell her goodbye. But somehow, she was breathing on her own, and she looked so absolutely beautiful, like she was sleeping, and he was suddenly praying. She was alive and breathing when she shouldn't be. That had to be a miracle. So please, could there just be one more miracle to save her? "Roz, it's okay. I'm right here." He whispered to her. Just one more miracle. That wasn't asking too much. Please, just give them one more miracle. Rosalind didn't deserve this. Just give her one more miracle. He felt tears sting his eyes. Whatever it took, he would do it if she would just get one more tiny miracle.


	4. Chapter 4

Daisy almost jumped when her phone buzzed. She grabbed it, a worried expression on her face when she saw the time, just five minutes later than it had been when she last checked it, but that was still three hours since Coulson had walked down that hallway to tell Rosalind goodbye. Where was he? She had seen the doctor she had known from the records she had hacked was the one taking care of Rosalind going down the hall towards the room too, well over an hour before She wasn't a doctor or anything, but taking someone off life support, that couldn't take long, so why hadn't Coulson came back?

The phone buzzed again, snapping her out of her worry, and she hurried to the waiting room's bathroom for privacy before she dared answer. "Hello?"

"Daisy, where are you and Coulson?" Melinda asked her. "Koenig saw the two of you leaving the base."

"I'm so sorry. I probably should have came and told you what was going on first before I told Coulson what I found out." Why hadn't she done that? She should have done that.

"Daisy, what's going on?" Melinda asked, hearing the worry in the younger agent's voice. "What happened?"

"After everything with the alien planet, Coulson asked me to find out when Rosalind's funeral was, or where she was buried. I know I probably should have told you about that too but…."

"Daisy, it's alright. Are the two of you at the cemetery still?" They had been gone over three hours, though. Even giving them time to stop for flowers, that was longer than she wanted to think about Phil having to stand at Rosalind's graveside given how he was still blaming himself for her death. "Where? I'll be right there."

"We're not…. Okay, I checked the papers looking for the obituary, and I checked this site, , thinking she might be listed on there too, but there was nothing. So I started thinking with the ATCU situation that maybe they kept her funeral private and out of the newspapers and everything, so I hacked the coroner's office. Only there wasn't anything there with information on her death either, which I know Coulson needed the information, but I was kind of glad I couldn't find anything there because I really didn't want to accidentally bring up and autopsy photo and see what Ward did to her."

"Daisy, where are you?"

"Sorry, I'm taking too long, I know. Basically, I had to hack pretty much everyone I could think of, but I finally found something a few hours ago. Rosalind…. When the police and everyone got there, and someone finally got around to checking her, they found a really weak pulse."

"She's alive?" And for the first time in a long time, Melinda felt a smile on her face at the thought of Phil, and how he must have felt to be given a miracle like that. But she reminded herself to focus on business. Rosalind was alive and even with what they had done, taking out the castle and the portal, Hydra was still out there and she could be in danger. "Let me go and get Lincoln and Jemma. Can you send the medical reports on her to them so we can get a room ready?" Honestly she was surprised that Phil wasn't already back, hustling Rosalind to safety. "She is stable enough to be moved, right?" Two weeks, surely she was, even though from what she had heard of how Rosalind had been shot, the injury had been horrific.

"She's in a coma." Daisy said as tears stung her eyes. Why hadn't she shot Ward in the head? Why hadn't she let him die when Mike had been forced to kidnap her? Everyone would have been so much better off if Ward had died then! "The doctors said that there wasn't anything else that they could do for her, so her family decided to take her off the machines and let her go."

A wave of agony slammed into her as she imagined Phil's reaction to Daisy having to give him that heartbreaking news. "Phil's with her?"

"He told me to wait in the lounge. I saw her doctor go back to her room over and hour ago, though, and he's still not back. What should I do? I want to go check on him, but if he's still sitting with her or something, because that's apparently what they let you do here from what I've heard in the lounge, they let you stay as long as you want afterwards. I don't want to interrupt him, and her family's there, or at least a sister or something, so I don't want to upset her so…."

Phil dealing with Rosalind's family, Melinda was sensing the potential for a disaster there. As devastated as he was, and finding out that Rosalind had been alive and he had left her there, Phil was in no condition to be facing her family. Who knows what he might end up confessing in a wave of guilt and self-hate? But she couldn't send Daisy to try to deal with it. As good as she was, handling something like this wasn't a something she would push off onto anyone else. "Send me the information on where you are and stay where you are. I'm on my way." What condition Phil would be in when she got there, though, that wasn't something she was looking forward to seeing.


	5. Chapter 5

"Do you think that you could turn the monitors back on?" Celia asked as the nurse came into Rosalind's room.

"Are you sure you want to do that?" she asked. "A lot of the time families find it distracting."

"I'm sure. We want to see." Celia said. An hour. It had been over an hour now since Rosalind had been off of the machines. Her breathing was still strong and steady, and her hands were still soft and warm. How could she be dying like the doctor had said when she seemed so alive still?

"Alright." The nurse moved to Rosalind's bedside and took a moment to gently feel her pulse before turning the monitors back on. Her pulse still felt regular and strong, and her breathing looked good, but she had been a nurse working with terminal patients for long enough to know that it was just a matter of time. She hated it when it was a case like this, with a patient who was fairly young and dying due to an injury not an illness, not only because it was hard seeing a life cut short so abruptly, but because it seemed like a patient who had been healthy before abruptly ending up in this condition had a tendency to linger. A body that had been healthy fighting stubbornly on even when there was no hope and prolonging the suffering of everyone. "The doctor left an order for more pain medication to make sure she's comfortable and doesn't have to go through the agonal breathing again."

"But she isn't doing that now. She's breathing alright on her own." Celia said.

"For now, but a lot of the time patients will cycle between regular breathing and agonal breathing. If we keep on top of that and give her appropriate medication before the agonal cycle starts, we can keep her more comfortable until she goes."

Coulson didn't want to say anything. It wasn't as if he had any right to have a say in Rosalind's care. It was a miracle that her sister hadn't thrown him out of the room, knowing that he had been there when Rosalind had been injured and he had left her there, bleeding out. He wasn't sure he would have been able to be as kind in her position. But looking over at her, seeing the conflicted look on her face, he felt like he had to speak up. "Can we have a few minutes to talk about it?" He asked. "She seems comfortable for the moment so we probably have some time, right?"

The nurse looked over at him, puzzled about who the man was. From what she understood from the reports from social services, who had offered to have someone present, the sister was Ms. Price's only family.

"He's my sister's fiance. He's been out of the country and I couldn't get in touch with him." Celia said. "We can wait, though, right? Because she seems comfortable right now."

"If you want to you can wait a little while. You just don't want to wait too long and let her pain levels get too high is all." the nurse told her. "I'll be back in fifteen minutes, or if you think she needs something before then, just press the call button and page me."

"I'm sorry about that." Celia said as soon as the nurse was gone. "I didn't want to accidentally let something slip and fiance who was out of the country, they're not going to ask too many questions, right?" She looked down at her sister, and then up at Phil. "You don't think she's in pain, do you? She looks comfortable, right?"

Phil wished he could get Jemma or Lincoln in there to take a look and give their opinions They would know way more than he did. Still, he looked up at the monitors and then back at Rosalind. It looked like her vital signs were steady, and her breathing was easy. If she was in pain, or even confused and frightened, wouldn't there be some sort of change in her vital signs? Would she look the way she did, like she was just sleeping? "I don't know." He finally said. "I'm not an expert, but she doesn't seem like she's in pain. Her vital signs seem steady, and her breathing looks good. I would think there would be something that we could see with one of them if she was hurting."

"I don't want her to be in pain or scared." Celia said softly. "But what if…. She wasn't able to breathe on her own before. Roz had it written down, that if she was dependent on a ventilator and she couldn't breathe on her own after three tries to get her off of the machine, to let her go. I had them try four times, and she wasn't able to even try taking a breath on her own. But she's breathing now, and what if she's trying to come back and the medicines sedate her too much or something? I don't want her to be in pain, but if there's a chance I can get my sister back…." She reached out with the hand that wasn't clutching Rosalind's and stroked her sister's hair again. "I just want my sister back."

"She spelled things out in that much detail? How many times to try?"

Celia nodded. "She did it after her husband died when she realized that I would be the one who would have to make any decisions like that. She wanted me to be totally sure of what she wanted so I wouldn't feel guilty. But I do, anyway." She whispered. "I want my sister back, but what if she's in a condition she wouldn't want to live in?"

What could he tell her? He wanted Rosalind back too, wanted her back so much. "I don't know. I wish I did. Have the doctors said anything about brain damage?" Brain damage. Fitz had suffered that, and he had found ways to work around it and become functional again. Was that a possibility for Rosalind? She probably was at least fifteen years older, though. Would that make any chance of recovery harder?

"They talked about diminished brain activity. Is that not as bad as brain damage, maybe?" Celia asked hopefully, as she continued to stroke Rosalind's hair. She had spent two weeks praying for her sister to come back, and then the last few hours praying for the courage to let her go. Now she didn't know what to pray for. She wanted Rosalind back. If her sister had suffered some permanent injury, she would happily take her home and care for her. She just wanted her back, but what about what Rosalind would want?

"I don't know." Really, he needed to call and let Melinda know what was going on, he needed to talk to Jemma and Lincoln, to try to get their opinion on Rosalind's chances, but a part of him was reluctant at the same time. What if he talked to them and they agreed with her doctor that there wasn't any hope for her recovery? "She's comfortable for right now. She's breathing well on her own, her vital signs are strong. What harm would it do to maybe have a little hope?" Although he knew how much it would hurt if that hope turned out to be false, how could he not hold out hope for Rosalind recovering, even if the chances were small?

Celia nodded. "Maybe…. There was swelling from the gunshot. It put pressure on her spinal cord for awhile. Maybe that could have caused some of the problems and it's finally going down? They said they thought it had resolved, but maybe it wasn't completely?"

Her spine. Somehow he had completely failed to think about the potential for spinal damage with how Roz had been shot. "Did they think there was going to be paralysis?" But shot that high up in the neck , they wouldn't have bothered to try to see if she could breathe on her own, an injury to the spinal cord like that would pretty much make that impossible, he was afraid.

"They weren't totally sure. They thought that there wasn't spinal damage, just swelling that was putting pressure on her spinal cord, and that seemed to resolve pretty fast, but they said they wouldn't be totally sure until she woke up, and then she didn't so…." Spinal damage, other complications from that swelling, Celia really didn't want to think about it, and what her sister might be condemned to if she did live. All she wanted so badly was for her to live.

Possible paralysis, who knows what other damage. Coulson cringed inwardly at the thought but still he couldn't bring himself to give up the hope that had suddenly sprang to life when Roz started breathing on his own. "Roz?" He leaned over her and whispered in her ear. "I'm here. I'm right here. Your sister and I are right here, and we're going to stay here with you, I promise. You just keep fighting for us, alright?" Was it selfish? Maybe, but he couldn't help it. "I love you. Please, hold on."


	6. Chapter 6

"Daisy?" Melinda had entered the waiting room without Daisy noticing, and the young agent jumped when she dropped into the chair beside her.

"I'm so glad you're here." Daisy let out a sigh at the sight of Melinda once she got over how she was able to move without being noticed. Was she going to be able to do that one day? Of course, with her powers, not being noticed was probably not really going to be a thing that worked out well for her. "I'm sorry I didn't talk to you and let you know what was going on. I know I should have. I…."

"It's okay. You were trying to take care of Coulson. It's fine. Where is he?" Melinda asked.

"Still in Rosalind's room." Daisy told her. "I'm really getting worried. It's been two hours since I saw her doctor go back there, and he came back out about fifteen minutes later, so I'm pretty sure that it's over. They'll let you stay as long as you want after. I heard people talking about that, but two hours, I'm really worried." Two hours. Daisy couldn't imagine what condition Coulson was going to be in if he had been sitting with Rosalind's body for two hours trying to say goodbye to her. The condition he had been in after the shooting and thinking he had lost her had been heartbreaking. How much worse was he going to be now, having to watch her die a second time? "I should have gone and checked on him. I'm sorry. I know I should have gone and checked on him. I was afraid that I might make things worse though and…. I should have gone and checked on him."

"No, it's probably best you didn't. Did you say something about Rosalind having a sister who was here? What do you know about her?"

"Not a lot." She looked around before saying anything else, not wanting to be overheard, but the only other people in the room at the moment were the group of kids clustered by the television watching cartoons. "I found out a few things when I hacked the medical records. She's her younger sister. She's been here since the day after Rosalind got shot and she pretty much hasn't left her bedside since she got here."

"So Phil definitely had to meet her." Melinda could imagine so many ways that such a meeting could go wrong. But one thing reassured her, the fact that Coulson wasn't back yet. As much as it broke her heart to think of him having to sit at Rosalind's bedside trying to tell her goodbye, the fact that he was still back there and her sister hadn't ordered him thrown out meant that he hadn't let something slip about what had happened.

"He definitely had to meet her." Daisy said. "She basically hasn't left her sister for two weeks, so I don't imagine she wouldn't want to be there at the end. I'm sorry. I should have gone with him, no matter what he said. He didn't need to have to face seeing her like that and dealing with her family alone. I don't know what I was thinking. I should have gone with him."

"It's probably better that you didn't with her sister there. More people would just lead to more questions, which is what we don't need at the moment." Melinda thought, debating, trying to think of the best way to handle the situation. "What else do you know about her sister?"

"She's a kindergarten teacher. I think a real kindergarten teacher, not some sort of cover story or something. I looked her up on Facebook, Instagram and Pintrest. She's got a ton of kids' stuff up, art projects and teaching stuff and all of that. Her Facebook was kind of sad. There were messages from people saying they hoped her sister was feeling better. I guess she hasn't been updating anyone on what's going on beyond letting them know that her sister was sick or hurt or something."

A civilian. That could either complicate the situation or make it better, Melinda thought. How much would Rosalind have told her sister about the situation, about Phil? Hopefully just enough to get her to accept him and to not ask many questions. They didn't need her sister asking questions. She was very much afraid of what sorts of things Phil might be driven to confess if her sister asked questions.

"So, what do we do?" Daisy asked her.

"Wait here. Call Mack and see if he can take over again for at least the next few days until the funeral's over." The funeral. Phil would definitely want to be there, which made it all the more urgent that she get back to that room and kept the situation under control. "I'll go and see about him, see about sitting with him until he's ready to go." How much longer would he want to stay with Rosalind? She couldn't imagine the potential damage having to sit with her body was doing to him.

"She's still breathing alright. It looks like she's still breathing alright to you, doesn't it?" Celia asked anxiously as she looked up from her sister and then quickly back down, afraid that there would be some sort of awful change if she looked away for an instant.

"It looks like she's just sleeping." Phil said. And honestly, to him it did. Was there something that he was missing, that would show that the doctor was right and that Rosalind was still dying? He wasn't an expert, but he had been in medical with enough agents over the years to have an idea of how to read the monitors she was attached to and her vitals looked strong and steady, her breathing easy. How could she be still dying? What could he say to her sister though? What if the doctor was right? What if he ended up giving her false hope, but at the same time with every minute that Rosalind stayed stable, he couldn't keep hope from slipping in. "What were the doctors doing for her before they decided that she wasn't going to recover?"

"Even though she was already in a coma, they gave her something to keep her sedated for five or six days. They didn't want to take the chance that she would start coming out of the coma, get agitated and accidentally hurt herself with the damage to her throat, and they were giving the swelling time to go down." Celia told him as she stroked her sister's hair with one hand, the other gently rubbing her back. When the nurse had returned, she had extremely reluctantly accepted their decision not to up the pain medicine. She had moved Rosalind partially onto her side, pillows propped beneath one hip to keep her turned while at the same time keeping her injured neck from moving too much. "They told me to talk to her so I did. I played music and videos and tried to pretend like this was some sort of girls' night in. I don't know. I don't know if she could hear me or if she knew anything I was doing, but…." Celia felt tears threatening to overcome her as she remembered what she had done after the doctors had told her that there was nothing more that could be done and she had made the painful decision to follow her sister's wishes and let her go. She had played music that Rosalind had loved for hours, the music that had played at her wedding, had insisted she have her hair washed and be dressed in comfortable pajamas, not a hospital gown. She had just tried to love her so much, hoping that some part of her might still be able to feel that somehow and be comforted by it. She hoped now that Rosalind could feel that love. If there was any chance at all that her sister could make it through this, she hoped she could feel that love and it would give her the strength to keep fighting.

"Did they try anything to bring her out of the coma or…."

"There were different medicines that they tried. I think the thought at first that the coma might have been related to the swelling around her spine, so they were giving her things to reduce that. They had a physical therapist work with her a little. I think that might have at least made her a bit more comfortable, but with how they weren't able to get her off the vent, there was only so much therapy could do. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I don't know all of the details. It just kind of got blurry after awhile with so many doctors coming and going, and then people from the government popping up, who would have clearly preferred it if Rosalind had died the night she was shot…."

"Did they actually say or do anything?" Coulson asked her. Rosalind didn't have the least bit of protection. He had noticed that when he arrived. Had that been deliberate in the hope that something would happen to her? Protection. He had failed to protect Rosalind before but maybe he could now. If Celia would agree, that is. After how he had failed Rosalind before, Celia had every right not to trust him to keep her sister safe now. "If you want me to, I could call my people and see about setting up some sort of security. I know I messed up and didn't keep her safe before, but… I promise, I would happily die to protect her now."

"Do you think that someone might really come after her?" Celia whispered, looking up from her sister, eyes suddenly filled with fright. Rosalind was so badly hurt, the doctors said she was dying, why would anyone want to hurt her sister when she was in that condition? But if there was even a slight chance someone might try something…. "Please, whatever you can do to keep her safe, do it!"

"Okay." This was something he could do beyond holding Rosalind's hand and hoping for a miracle, and Coulson grabbed on to it. Who would be best to get for a protection detail? Daisy, obviously, since he was already there. He started to get up to go talk to her, but then he stopped, reluctant to move. What if something happened in the few minutes he would be gone? Or what if Rosalind was aware somehow and thought he had abandoned her again? He needed to talk to Daisy, to get her to call in some of the others, probably Lincoln would be best and maybe he could offer some suggestions for the medical situation too, but how could he leave her now, even for a few minutes, even for the best of reasons?

Melinda stopped outside the door to Rosalind's hospital room, bracing herself for the situation she was going to have to deal with. Rosalind had somehow survived the initial gunshot, and she didn't regret that had happened. Phil deserved the chance to see her again in a better condition than she had been that awful night, drowning in her own blood. He deserved a chance to say goodbye properly to her. Still, knowing the pain her would be in after seeing her again and then having to loose her, her heart ached for him.

She wouldn't let him go though this alone, though. Phil had been there for her, even when she didn't want anyone there for her, and she would be there for him too. The door was open just a rack and she eased it open a bit more, just enough to slide in, moving quietly so as not to disturb him or Rosalind's sister. She must have made some sort of noise, though, because Celia's head jerked up as soon as she slipped in, eyes going wide with fright.

"Melinda? It's okay. She's with me." Coulson reassured Celia before getting up. He was still reluctant to budge from Rosalind's bedside, but going only as far away as the door would be a lot better than having to go all the way down the hallway to the lounge to talk to Daisy. "I'll be right back. I just need to let her know what's going on so we can get some security set up, alright?"

"Phil? Daisy called me. She said they were taking Rosalind off life support." Melinda said as soon as they were out of the room with the door closed. She hadn't seen a lot in the few seconds she had been there, mainly Rosalind's startled and frightened sister, but she had caught a glimpse of the still figure in the bed, and more importantly, a look at the monitors she had still been hooked to. "She isn't….."

"They took her off the vent a couple of hours ago and she just started breathing on her own." Phil told her. He closed his eyes for a moment, pain washing over him as he recalled what the doctor had said. "Her doctor doesn't seem to think that it's going to make much of a difference, that she probably only has hours or days left but for now she seems stable."

Still dying. Hours or days. And Melinda knew that Phil wouldn't agree to leave until it was over. "I had Daisy call Mack. He can handle things as long as we need him to."

"Good. Can you see about setting up some sort of security detail too, to keep an eye on things? With the ATCU situation, they didn't arrange anything for Rosalind, which was probably alright when she was in a closed unit like ICU but here were anyone could walk in…."

Melinda didn't disagree or argue with him. Rosalind might still be dying, but she deserved for that death to be as natural as it could be under the circumstances. "I'll get something worked out. She'll be safe. What else do you need me to do?"

"Hope? Pray?" Maybe it was crazy, but Phil couldn't help grabbing on to that little sliver of hope and clutching it tight. Rosalind was still breathing, she was still with them. Maybe there was still a chance. Please, let there still be a chance for her to make it through this.


End file.
